They move through a darker, denser part of the woods, where oak and maple claim territory from the pines and where the underbrush becomes more compact, a mass of vine, leaf, and wild blossom. The ground rises in rolling slopes, and the footing is sometimes treacherous, over dewy growth or thick moss. The forest is all engulfing, a vast canopy and airy castle of trees, splendid, unimaginable. Nathan's heart pounds. The dim lit terrain rolls by, more alien with each step. Dead trees twist toward the sky, hung with garlands of sweet autumn clematis studded with seed heads gossamer as spider's egg sacs. The stillness affects all the boys, and Randy stops his singing. Roy continues to lead, his back sliding deftly through corridors of branches. Burke, meanwhile, walks closer to Nathan than before, and sometimes Nathan can almost feel his breath on his neck.
The path Roy promised soon appears. In fact it is not a path at all but the remnants of Poke's Road, an extension long forgotten, that once bisected the Kennicutt Woods. Honeysuckle has filled the ditch on one side and the other is overgrown with cattail and fern. Its course can be followed, although the roadbed has been retaken by the growth of grass and wild roses, thorn studded arid heavy. They pick their way carefully forward, swinging the branches aside with arcs of their arms. Above, the glimmering sky lightens beyond the laces of leaves, shadows shifting like a kaleidoscope.
They walk forward. Nathan's heart is pounding, and something like awe is rising in him, at the fact of the road and its destination but also at the eerie familiarity. Something prickles in the image, as if he already knows the place. The fall of light along a patch of broken fence strikes him as something he has seen before, there at the place where Roy is standing.
Further on, like a golden curtain, poplars stand in an airy thicket. Sunlight pours straight through the tender trunks.
Soon the road parallels another running stream. The boys follow them both till late morning, when Roy halts the march. The heat has begun to thicken under the broad shade.
"We ought to rest for a while," Roy says, stripping off his backpack and sprawling on the ground, "there's a ways further to go."
Randy lounges beside Roy while Burke ranges along the creek bank, where a bed of fern brushes his jeans. He runs his hands through his hair and scratches his chest. He paces up and down the clearing. When he turns, he is behind Roy and Randy, watching Nathan.
"It's hot as hell," Burke says.
"Sure is."
Randy hums, There is a place of quiet rest, near to the heart of God.
Burke scratches his chest under the shirt, then unbuttons the shirt and takes it off. His eyes are blank and flat, as if made of glass. But he still watches Nathan. He stands behind Roy and Randy, who do not see him.
His body is strong. He is bigger than he looks in the shirt. He has dense, square, ungraceful muscles, and a dark patch of hair in the cleft of his chest. His arms are thick and brawny, and he stretches them upward in the sunlight. His expression never changes. Nathan, embarrassed, looks away, then quickly back again. Burke is still watching, stretching his arms, shaking them, then finally turning away himself, kneeling at the side of the creek and splashing his face with water.
Nathan's heart suddenly pounds, and he takes a seat near Roy, though not as near Roy as he might have.
Burke stands with the sun falling over his bare shoulders.
Randy says, "This place is a little spooky?
"People don't come down here too much." Roy chews a blade of grass. "My Uncle Heben brought me out here, when I was little."
"Where?" Burke asked, idly twisting his forearms.
"There's an old farm at the end. With a big house. Nobody lives there anymore."
Something about the simple description causes them all to peer down the road. The promise of an abandoned house. "How far?" Nathan asks.
Their eyes do meet. The softness of Roy surrounds Nathan. "We still got a good ways to walk."
Burke bends over the pack he has been carrying on his shoulders, and when he straightens he is holding the clear flat bottle, half full of whiskey. He curls the bottle to his mouth.
The prickle in Nathan's scalp makes him stand, suddenly, walking to another part of the clearing. Roy watches, puzzled.
Burke says, "I like a drink of liquor. You want one, Randy?"
"Not yet."
"Roy?"
"Nope."
Burke laughs. "Fine. More for me I guess." And curls his arm again.
Nathan turns to Roy, who is standing. Roy says, "It's time to walk," and slings his pack over his shoulders. Nathan follows him to the remains of the road, as Randy scrambles to his feet.
Burke, eyeing Nathan, screws the top on the bottle, shoving it into his pocket He clears his throat. He has tied the shirt around his waist. There is something about the display of his body, the arrogance of it, that troubles Nathan.
